“Yes, sir.”
There were uniforms—white hats from the Traffic Division, not policemen from the Fourteenth District, which included Chestnut Hill—directing traffic on Glengarry Lane in Chestnut Hill. The mayoral limousine was quickly waved to the head of the line of cars waiting to pass through the ornate gates of the five-acre estate. As the Cadillac rolled past, each uniform saluted and got a wave from the Mayor in return.The long, curving drive to the turn-of-the-century Peebles mansion was lined with parked cars, and there a cluster of chauffeurs gathered around a dozen limousines—including three Rolls Royces, Jerry Carlucci noticed—parked near the mansion itself.
If is wasn’t for what’s going to be on the front page of every newspaper in town tomorrow, the Mayor thought, tonight would be a real opportunity. Now all I can hope for is to minimize the damage, keep these people from wondering
whether they’re betting on the wrong horse.
There was a man in a dinner jacket collecting invitations just outside the door. He didn’t ask for the Mayor’s, confirming the Mayor’s suspicion that he looked familiar, and was probably a retired police officer, now working as a rent-a-cop for Wachenhut Security, or something like that.
The reception line consisted of Mr. and Mrs. Brewster Cortland Payne II, Miss Martha Peebles, and Mr.—Captain—David Pekach.
“Mrs. Carlucci, Mr. Mayor,” Payne said. “How nice to see you.”
Payne and Pekach were wearing dinner jackets.
Probably most everybody here will be wearing a monkey suit but me, the Mayor thought. But it couldn’t be helped. I couldn’t have shown up at Tony Cannatello’s viewing wearing a monkey suit and looking like I was headed right from the funeral home to a fancy party.
“We’re happy to be here, Mr. Payne.”
“You know my wife, don’t you? And Miss Peebles?”
“How are you, Angeline?” Mrs. Patricia Payne said. “I like your dress.”
Patricia Payne and Martha Peebles were dressed similarly, in black, off-the-shoulder cocktail dresses. The Peebles woman had a double string of large pearls reaching to the valley of her breasts, and Mrs. Payne a single strand of pearls.
Nice chest, the Mayor thought, vis-à-vis Miss Peebles. Nice-looking woman. She’d be a real catch for Dave Pekach even without all that money.
And then, slightly piqued: Yeah, of course I know your wife. I’ve known her longer than you have. I carried her first husband’s casket out of St. Dominic’s when we buried him. And as long as we’ve known each other, isn’t it about time you started calling me “Jerry”?
“How is it, Patricia,” Angeline Carlucci spoke truthfully, “that you still look like a girl?”
The Mayor had a sudden clear mental image of the white, grief-stricken face of the young widow of Sergeant John X. Moffitt, blown away by a scumbag when answering a silent alarm at a gas station, as they lowered his casket into the ground in St. Dominic’s cemetery.
A long time ago. Twenty-five years ago. I was Captain of Highway when Jack Moffitt got killed.
Angie’s right. She does look good. Real good. She’s a Main Line lady now, a long way from being a cop’s widow living with her family off Roosevelt Boulevard.
“I’m so glad you could come,” Martha Peebles said to Angeline Carlucci.
“Oh, Jerry wouldn’t have missed it for the world,” Angeline said.
“No, I wouldn’t,” the Mayor agreed. “Thank you for having us, Miss Peebles.”
“Oh, Martha, please,” she said as she took his hand.
Then the Mayor put his hand out to Captain Pekach.
“Don’t you look spiffy, Dave,” he said.
“Mr. Mayor.”
“There’s a rumor going around that some unfortunate girl who doesn’t know what she’s getting into has agreed to marry you. Anything to it?”
Martha Peebles giggled. Dave Pekach looked at her and smiled uneasily at the Mayor but didn’t reply.
A waiter in a white jacket stood at the end of the reception line holding a tray of champagne glasses. Angeline took one. The waiter, seeing the indecision on the Mayor’s face, said, “There is a bar in the sitting room to your left, Mr. Mayor.”
“A little champagne will do just fine,” the Mayor said, and took a glass. “But thank you.”